Amid coronavirus uncertainty, Gov. J.B. Pritzker and other top Democrats back increased mail-in voting in November. But it’s not that simple.

Voters drop off their presidential primary mail-in ballots at a drop box at King County Elections in Renton, Washington, on March 10, 2020. (Jason Redmond / AFP)

Fears over the coronavirus pandemic and an emphasis on social distancing have fueled calls for restructuring Illinois’ Nov. 3 general election, including a push for a large-scale mail-in voting system.

But increased voting by mail comes with cautionary notes both political and practical.

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Even advocates acknowledge the need to allow people — among them those who don’t trust the post office — to show up at a polling place to cast their vote.

There are also the added costs of printing, mailing, securing and counting mail-in ballots, as well as allowing for drop-off boxes for those who don’t believe their vote will be delivered in time.

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Illinois, with among the most open voting access laws in the nation, already allows anyone to vote by mail without having to give a reason. Voters can seek an application for a vote-by-mail ballot as early as Sept. 24, more than five weeks before Election Day. Ballots have to be postmarked by Election Day and they are valid even if election authorities don’t get them until two weeks afterward.

That should be sufficient, leading Republicans in the state say, since anyone who wants to vote by mail can already do so, not to mention their concerns about costs and potential vote fraud.

But the state’s top Democrats and other supporters of large-scale voting by mail say more federal money is needed to secure voting systems in the coronavirus era, and that shortening the time frame for early voting and moving to centralized polling places could end up saving money.

Supporters of increased mail-in voting point to the chaos in Wisconsin, where Democratic Gov. Tony Evers’ eleventh-hour effort to move to at-large mail voting with extended ballot return dates was overturned by the courts as was his bid to delay the April 7 primary.

Rain falls on people waiting in line to vote at Milwaukee Marshall High School in Milwaukee on April 7, 2020. (Lauren Justice/The New York Times)

Poll workers’ fears of coronavirus led to the consolidation of polling places into only five voting centers in Milwaukee, causing hourslong waits

Every other state with an election scheduled for April postponed their contest or shifted to mail-in voting.

Illinois’ March 17 primary went on as scheduled with in-person voting encouraged on Election Day despite orders banning large gatherings and personal distancing recommendations. Nonetheless, turnout in Chicago was about 38% — far from the recent record low of 24.5% in 2012 and well above what many local officials had feared.

Democratic Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s stay-at-home order went into effect just four days after the primary.

“We totally dodged a bullet on that,” said state Sen. Julie Morrison, D-Lake Forest, who is crafting a measure for lawmakers to consider when they return to Springfield that would send a mail-in ballot to every registered voter for the Nov. 3 election, among other provisions.

“Other states have done it. Other states are doing it. I think Illinois needs to figure out a way to adjust and evolve, and this is as good a time as any. I think there’s a lot of people in both parties who feel it’s time to try it,” she said.

Five states now conduct large-scale mail-in voting: Washington, Oregon, Colorado, Hawaii and Utah. Four other states — Arizona, California, Montana and New Mexico — received a majority of their votes by mail in this year’s truncated primary season.

Lori Augino, president of the National Association of State Election Directors, acknowledged in an email to state election administrators that “it sounds like a no-brainer to keep your voters out of the polling places and keep your poll workers safe.”

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But Augino, who is director of elections for the state of Washington, added, “With 25 years of vote-by-mail experience, I offer some advice and caution.”

Among the many issues is cost. Mailing a postage-paid ballot to each of Illinois’ more than 8 million registered voters would require nearly twice the $13.8 million the state received from the recent federal stimulus act for dealing with pandemic election issues. And that figure doesn’t include the potential of extra staffing and security to store and count a massive number of mailed ballots.

Officials in other states warn that mail-in ballots face high rejection rates due to questions over signatures matching up and urge the use of professionals and software to improve recognition. To prevent fraud, it’s also recommended that mail ballots contain scanner technology that would allow officials to match the voter mailing in the ballot to anyone trying to vote in person.

The Brennan Center for Justice, founded by former law clerks to the late Justice William J. Brennan Jr., has been a longtime advocate of expanding voter rights. In its review of states prepared to deal with an election under pandemic circumstances, Illinois fares fairly well despite lacking the infrastructure for a fully vote-by-mail election.

In addition to no-excuse absentee balloting, the state allows in-person early voting, online voter registration and same-day voter registration.

But the Brennan Center proposes that Illinois institute an online vote-by-mail voter application system and the creation of regional voting centers like those used in Chicago.

On March 17, Chicago’s early voting centers, where people from all parts of the city can vote, were put into use as alternatives to precinct polling places that were forced to move or close due to COVID-19 fears.

While early voting has gained in popularity in Illinois, voting by mail had not seen large-scale acceptance before the March 17 primary.

In Chicago, with concerns over the coronavirus building, more than 117,000 ballots were sent to voters by mail and more than 91,993 returned — a 78.5% return rate. But of the ballots returned, 8,632 ultimately were rejected as having been postmarked after the March 17 election or for other reasons.

Statewide, more than 230,000 mail-in ballots were turned in to election officials, State Board of Elections officials said. That’s up by 100,000 from the 2016 presidential primary, officials said. Total voter turnout in the state, which was in the millions, won’t be certified until April 17.

“Illinois is pretty well set up if we wanted to heavily move to a voting-by-mail system. Our system is pretty open. It’s pretty easy to use,” said Matt Dietrich, spokesman for the state elections board.

State Sen. Julie Morrison speaks during an event July 13, 2019, in Highland Park. (Mark Kodiak Ukena/for the Pioneer Press)

Morrison, a former township supervisor who has been in the state Senate for seven years, said she has been working on a plan to institute a statewide pilot program for large-scale vote-by-mail for the Nov. 3 general election.

“There’s such apprehension, especially among older people, about going into the polling place,” she said. “The bill that I’ve got is just for this general election cycle. It would allow for any registered voter to get a ballot in the mail and then it would be prepaid return postage.”

Morrison said her proposal, which is still in the concept stage, would make early voting “more focused” by limiting it to the three days before Election Day rather than up to 40 days before an election, as is now the case, to cut down on staffing and expenses.

“You would have the opportunity, if you couldn’t wrap your head around or didn’t trust the mail or thought that (in-person) was the way the Constitution meant you to vote, to have three days before the actual election and then Election Day itself to go in and cast your ballot the old-fashioned way,” she said.

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Additionally, in-person early voting and Election Day voting would be held at more centralized voting centers, located near public transportation, to cut down on the need and expense of locating polling places in voting precincts.

“Schools, for example, don’t want to be polling places anymore because of the safety factor and of having strangers walking into and out of your school,” she said. “I think that’s another reason we need to be really looking at a more focused vote-by-mail program.”

But the Illinois Association of County Clerks and Recorders opposes legislation to automatically send a mail-in ballot to all registered voters.

The group’s president, Chuck Venvertloh, the county clerk and recorder of Adams County along the Mississippi River in Quincy, cites “the logistical issues surrounding delayed results based on having over 50% of the ballots mailed out not yet returned” by Election Day.

“With that many ballots outstanding, candidates would be waiting for two weeks after the election to see who won,” Venvertloh said.

He also said the cost would be “prohibitive.”

“Where do we get $28 million every election? Illinois is broke,” Venvertloh said. “I think this is a case where the legislators need to listen to the people tasked with running the elections.”

Venvertloh said the association does support the creation of a permanent vote-by-mail list that would automatically send a ballot to residents who want to vote by mail for general elections. The organization also backs the concept of centralized voting centers as an alternative to precinct polling places.

In addition to cost and implementation concerns, there’s plenty of politics involved.

At a recent news conference, Pritzker said increased mail-in voting may be necessary in November.

“I do think that we’re going to have to look at, for the general election, the idea that we may have to move to a significant amount, or maybe all mail-in ballots, or at least giving people the opportunity to do that," he said.

Democrats who control the General Assembly have generally backed Pritzker on increasing vote-by-mail. The party has benefited over the years by having a more robust organized absentee and vote-by-mail program than Republicans.

Last year, as part of negotiations over the state’s massive capital construction program, Democrats floated a plan to permanently mail absentee ballot applications to everyone who voted by mail in the 2018 governor’s race — when Pritzker far outpaced Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner in vote-by-mail.

The proposal was dropped amid GOP complaints.

Republicans nationally, led by President Donald Trump, have been critical of Democratic attempts to facilitate large-scale voting by mail.

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“Republicans should fight very hard when it comes to state wide mail-in voting. Democrats are clamoring for it. Tremendous potential for voter fraud, and for whatever reason, doesn’t work out well for Republicans,” Trump tweeted Wednesday.

Trump voted by mail last month in the Florida primary but said his case was different because he could not travel to the state to cast an in-person ballot.

Various studies have shown election fraud to be rare, though there have been instances involving mail-in voting, most notably in a 2018 North Carolina congressional race when a campaign aide who harvested absentee ballots for Republican candidate Mark Harris was charged with election fraud.

House Republican leader Jim Durkin listens as Gov. J.B. Pritzker delivers his first State of the State speech before a joint session of the Illinois House and Senate at the State Capitol in Springfield on Jan. 29, 2020. (E. Jason Wambsgans / Chicago Tribune)

In Illinois, House Republican leader Jim Durkin of Western Springs said he is opposed to any effort to expand vote-by-mail, calling it “government overreach” and saying “there is no problem of individuals taking advantage of what is currently in law.”

“It’s going to cost Illinois more money than we need to spend on something that can be accomplished through the traditional ways that people have voted. Voting by mail causes problems,” Durkin said. “And, quite frankly, in Illinois, voting by mail is subject to manipulation.”